Saturday, October 8, 2016

Joshua and Jenni and Joshua's Class Reunion

I didn't write a blog-post last night. I'll get back to my daily posts on Down Syndrome...maybe tomorrow.

First of all, I was honored to be "interviewed" by Kelly Stamps in her Friday Fellowship posts this week. She asked me to participate, and...not gonna lie...I answered all of the questions, and then let it sit in my "drafts" folder for 6 days.

SIX DAYS.

I am a pretty private person, and so I was about to be a nervous wreck at the thought of sharing my heart with a bunch of strangers. I meant to run this whole thing by Holly first, because she will tell me something is okay. She will also give me a resounding, "NO, Mom" if it's not.

But I ended up not telling her about it until Thursday...and only because Kelly said she might run it the next day. EEEK!

I woke up to my phone buzzing, friends texting to give me encouragement. We had the baby all day, so I did not get on Facebook at ALL until last night. I was overwhelmed at the sweet comments.

If you want to read a little more about my family, check it out.

The other thing that happened on Friday...well, let me back up. My husband was out-of-town this week for work. On the day he was supposed to come home, he told me that he had offered to take his Dad down to Louisiana, for a meeting on some family issues. If you follow me here, you know that both my Dad and Jim's Dad are not doing well, health-wise.

I thought it was so kind of Jim to offer to drive his Dad, but selfishly...it had been a long week, and I wanted him to just.come.home.

Of course, I didn't say anything to anyone about my feelings. They might have been justified, but they still seemed incredibly selfish on my part. So I was feeling a little sad about spending another night without Jim, and then the whole next day...which was supposed to be his day off.

Joshua's class was having their 10 year reunion at the high school. They were having several events all weekend. Obviously, we can't just drop Joshua off to attend these things on his own, BUT we had planned on taking him to the Homecoming football game. He was super excited to see the people he graduated with. It's funny...memories of his school years, as over-all good as they were, make my stomach hurt SO MUCH...because those were very hard years. VERY hard. On him...and on us.

Just so much stress...day after day after day.

And even tho Joshua didn't have a lot of real friends...like how WE view friends...he thinks of everyone he graduated with as a friend.

Which...that's pretty sweet, considering most of them either ignored him, or simply tolerated him...all the way through school. Not every one of them...but most of them. Thankfully, Joshua doesn't view things like we do...and that's a good thing.

I was planning to take him myself, since Jim would be with his Dad. But Jim called late Thursday afternoon, and he was on his way HOME! His Dad had gotten an appointment with his doctor that day, and so he had canceled the trip to Louisiana. I was so happy!

Jim came home in time for dinner. Holly and Rhodie stayed and ate with us, because Aaron-the-son-in-law was ALSO out-of-town.

Friday morning, we just hung around here at home. Or, like Joshua tells me, on the days I pick him up from his Therapeutic Recreation Center: "Well, after you left, we just hanged around the center for a while..." So that's one of our family phrases, for when someone asks, "what did you do today?" We say, "we hanged around the center for a while." Ha.

But then I heard from Jenni-the-girlfriend's mom about 9 a.m.. Jenni was in the ER, and had been there since 3 a.m. I gave Joshua limited information. I could tell he was worried about her. He asked me several times for updates on her condition. Holly and the baby spent the day with us. We kept up on Jenni's condition the whole day. They ended up admitting her.

I texted Jenni's mom, and asked if Jenni was okay with having a visitor. At this point, the doctors were running tests on her, thinking she maybe had a bleeding ulcer or something like that. She was on iv fluids, and receiving meds through her iv to calm her stomach. I asked Joshua if he would like to go see her in the hospital...instead of going to his class reunion. I told him that we would do whatever he wanted to do.

He chose to go see Jenni in the hospital. His exact words were, "I'll just see my class friends at my 20 year reunion." Very matter-of-factly.

This is what we call, "Fred-time," because he really has no sense of time (or distance or space). One day, Aaron asked Joshua where he would like to go for a weekend, if he could go anywhere in the world. Joshua said, "Europe."

For a weekend.

So, Jim, Joshua, and I headed to the hospital. Jenni lives in another city, so it was a 35-40 minute drive. We decided to go eat first...and then go by the hospital. There was a big concert in town last night, and so the traffic was terrible around that area. After completely stuffing ourselves at dinner, we drove the 5 minutes to the hospital. Jenni was SO HAPPY to see him. Her face just lit up. He had brought her a big bag of goodies, so she spent a couple of minutes getting everything out.

Jim and I stood on one side of the room, and talked with Jenni's mom. We didn't notice when Jenni gathered up all of the stuff on her bed, and scooted over to one side. But Joshua noticed, and without a thought, climbed right up in that bed with her. He put his arm around her, and they rested their heads together and talked quietly.

If you follow me here, I've shared the life and SAGA of Joshua and Jenni. They have been "dating" for 12 years. They want to get married someday, even tho Jenni doesn't really want to leave her home and her parents. They both attend Therapeutic Recreation, but they will sometimes spend their entire day there...WITHOUT SAYING A WORD TO EACH OTHER.

Not even kidding.

They aren't a "couple" like we think a "couple" should be. They don't act the same as other couples, or treat each other the same way other couples do. I try my hardest not to get all up in their relationship. It seems to work for them.

Still. last night? Took my breath away. Watching her face when she saw him walk in...watching him care for her? For that moment in time, it.was.everything.

Also, side note: I have to keep reminding myself of that sweet sight, because Jenni's mom ended up telling us that the doctor's THINK Jenni had a very bad stomach bug. If you remember, we had the weekend of death from that thing (read updates here, here, here, and here) over the Labor Day weekend.

And then, as if that wasn't enough, I turned around to see Joshua plant a big, fat kiss...right on Jenni's mouth...as we were fixin' to leave.

And if you don't think I IMMEDIATELY started praying for death to the stomach virus germs all the way home in the car...and last night before bed...and when I woke up in the night...you'd be wrong.

"Our people must learn to do good by meeting the urgent needs of others; then they will not be unproductive." Titus 3:14

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